Quartz is a partnership between St John’s Dumfries and Wordsmith Crafts CIC. Simon is supported a day a week to work flexibly to support Quartz activities, maintain this site and help people use the arts to experience, explore, and express spirituality through the arts, and for those that choose to, “to enter into our heritage […]
From Tatyana: Saturday 22nd August 🕐 10:00-12:00 📍The Standard, Dumfries High street 🤗Families and kids welcome! A group of children from Lyubotyn in Ukraine, (where one of The Depot’s partner organisations is based), have sent us their drawings of Scotland as they know and imagine it. 🏴 So we’ve organised an exhibition for them at […]
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Connections
Our world in connected beyond the wildest dreams of people in the early 19th Century. Knowledge of the ends of the earth, and a desire to connect with it is not a new thing though. This article describes one such journey make at the command of a king who ruled in London over a thousand […]
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Future dates!
Dates for your diary “To be a Pilgrim” Sat 19th September This retreat day is being run by Church Without Walls near Wigtown. Simon is contributing a pilgrim badge casting workshop, The day will start with morning prayer and end with some reading of God’s message in creation. Follow this link to find out more […]
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QFC 16th of August 2026
Lughnasa, Lammas, First Fruits Quartz Forest Church in June. Gather at 2pm outside the Crichton Chapel. Please dress for the weather! We will adapt what we do to accommodate those who gather. Young, old, agile or infirm. Pure Dead Brilliant. At a time when the fruit we will feed on through the winter matures, lets […]
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Poems to find
A friend from our time at St Andrews has just published a book of his poetry. One poem called “Ripples” stood out in particular this morning, and so I dragged out some images and layered up my reflections in visual form. I have used this as the image for this post, and it is also […]
New technology has been acquired to use with Wordsmith Crafts video projects! But even before we have got it all working, you can watch videos on “The Floating Monastery” YouTube channel, as a taste of things to come. Find the whole channel here: https://www.youtube.com/TheFloatingMonastery and the Wordsmith Crafts general channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@Wordsmithcrafts
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The Hungry Months
In the (many) years before supermarkets the summer months were sometimes called the hungry months. Everything is ripening in the sun, but not ready yet. Nowadays we let things wind down for people to have holidays, or travel to outdoor events. You can read a bit more about the hungry months here. If you are […]
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Pump up the Volume
It might not be everyone’s ‘cup of tea’. It is rude, crude, and anti-establishment. Released in the 1990’s it references a time where radio was still remembered as a means to give a voice to hidden voices. The internet was already in existence, but websites and the dot-com boom were still to happen. I’m interested […]
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July 26 QFC
Summer holidays, Vikings events, it is a busy time. We are next gathering as Forest Church at the Crichton on the 16th of August. Please send in your photos and experiences of “reading” creation and finding God in everyday life. Something to think about while we are apart … To what extent do you expect […]
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Rushnyk Installation
The Tapestry has now been safely lowered and rolled ready to travel to its next destination. You can get a taste of the experience on YouTube though! This has been a technical challenge, but what a reward to walk under prayers woven into cloth. There has been a steady stream of people dropping in to […]